The king of Khotan sat in the warm spring water, sweating and shivering. He clung to the steps beside him, lest his legs slip into the water. A body of white flesh swayed in circles of ripples in the water, reflecting the bonfire on the side, floating and golden.

Liang Xiao closed his eyes comfortably and completely let go of the last trace of worry.

In terms of ear power, looking at the world, there are few people who can compare with him. Although the battlefield was five or six hundred paces away, the situation on the battlefield was known to him through the performance of sounds.

Although Guo Wu only had a hundred horsemen, in the face of more than a thousand bandits, he still had the absolute initiative, rushing back and forth, dripping with joy. The bandits barely fought back, and they were overwhelmed by him in one go.

On one side, there are more than 100 elite horsemen who are waiting for work, and on the other hand, there are bandits who want to pick up a cheap bandit, and the strength of the two sides is just like their strength, which is not the same grade at all. If it was a battle in formation, these bandits might still have a chance, but now that they have been scattered in formation, they are only left with the fate of being slaughtered.

Liang Xiao withdrew his attention to his side, and when he heard the sound of the king of Khotan shaking the spring water, he couldn't help laughing. "If the king is worried about the war, why don't you send someone to ask?"

"Okay, okay." The king of Khotan nodded again and again, and hurriedly sent guards to check.

"What's there to see?" Dongfang Shuo wiped a handful of water droplets from his face, spread his arms, leaned against the stone wall, and pouted. "What's there to see, listen to the sound and know who wins and who loses. King of Khotan, you are too cautious. ”

The king of Khotan smiled awkwardly, but he didn't care about Dongfang Shuo, shook his white flesh, climbed onto the shore, stood on tiptoe, and looked in the direction of the battlefield. Although in the darkness of the night, he could see nothing but a fire.

It didn't take long for the guards to gallop back, panting but ecstatic on their faces.

"Great victory, great victory, great victory."

"A big win?" The king of Khotan was stunned for a moment, and then he was stunned again. "How did you win?"

Guo ...... Captain Guo and the others rushed up and killed ...... Kill the bandits. They're hunting it down now. On the lake, on the lake......"

The king of Khotan was relieved, and then he was shocked. "What about our people?"

"I'm watching."

The king of Khotan was stunned again. Three hundred Khotanese soldiers were watching the battle, Pang Shuo and others were still in front of them, and only Guo Wu and others rushed up. 100 horsemen against more than 1,000 people, and they still killed each other? This sounds a little untrue.

Looking at the king of Khotan, who looked unconvinced, the guards were not confident anymore, and he also felt that this did not sound very reliable. "Why don't I go back and ask?"

"Go, go!" The king of Khotan waved his hand repeatedly.

The guards sped away again. The king of Khotan went back and forth twice on the shore, and when the night wind blew, he shivered, and hurried back to the spring. Dongfang Shuo raised his eyebrows and laughed. He glanced at Liang Xiao again and secretly gave a thumbs up.

If it weren't for Liang Xiao's insistence on taking the elite route and providing high-intensity combat training as much as possible, Guo Wu would not have created such a record. The difference between a hundred elite horsemen and a hundred knights may be one to two times the cost of food and equipment, but the difference in their combat power is at least five times. The combat power of Guo Wu's 100 cavalry is almost equivalent to the 500 cavalry of those Qiang cavalry, not to mention surprise, even if it is hard, there is no fear.

For a place like the Western Regions, the elite strategy is undoubtedly one of the few options.

Anything, as long as it is paranoid to a certain extent, will show unimaginable power, just like Liang Xiao has practiced the channeling technique for many years.

Dongfang Shuo raised his head, looked at the bright starry sky, and provoked a smug smile on the corner of his mouth.

After a short time, the guards of the king of Khotan rushed back again. This time, he also brought a small prince who witnessed how the Han army defeated the enemy. This little marquis painted a vivid picture of Guo Wu's tactics, and finally asked, "King, are we going to war?" ”

The king of Khotan looked back at Liang Xiao and Dongfang Shuo. Liang Xiao shook his head. "I don't think I need to. You are not well prepared, you are in a hurry, you can't help, and maybe you will drag down our army. You just have to watch first, there is still a battle to be fought next, and you can do more when the time comes. ”

"General, what else is the plan?" The king of Khotan smiled and came to Liang Xiao's side.

"Of course, it is to smash the lair of these bandits, sweep them all down, and retrieve the belongings they have robbed. After tonight's battle, their main force has been lost, and there are some old and weak women and children left, you won't find it difficult, right? ”

The king of Khotan woke up like a dream and was ecstatic. "General, if I can really get those belongings back, I will definitely give priority to supplying the general. Without a general, with my strength in Khotan, it would be impossible to be ashamed. ”

Liang Xiao smiled and didn't care. What he snatched back can still be due to the Khotanese king's irresponsible remarks? He has to give and he has to give, and he has to give if he doesn't.

Seeing Liang Xiao's expression, the king of Khotan was a little sneering, and then proposed: "General, the Han army is mighty, can you ask the general to leave some warriors to help me town?" ”

Liang Xiao raised his eyelids and finally glanced at the king of Khotan. "Why did the king say such a foreign thing, no matter how many misunderstandings we had before, since you have now paid tribute to my Han Dynasty, it is the responsibility of my Han army to protect you and your people. If not, why would I bother to trap these bandits? Don't worry, I'll keep some people here, and no one will dare to harass you again. ”

"That's great, that's great." The king of Khotan was smiling on his face, but his mouth was a little bitter. What he said and what Liang Xiao said seem to be the same thing, but they are not the same thing. He asked Liang Xiao to stay behind to help defend the country, and he still had the final say in Khotan. Liang Xiao sent people to guard the country of Khotan, and the country of Khotan was decided by Liang Xiao. After he, the king of Khotan, he can only honestly be a vassal of the Han people, and it is impossible for him to be as comfortable as before.

"Then it's settled." Liang Xiao got up. "The enemy from the east has almost been swept away, and the enemy from the west cannot let them retreat with their whole body. Big Tiger, Big Tiger. ”

Pang Shuo was secretly depressed when he heard the shouting and killing in the distance, and when he heard Liang Xiao's call, he hurriedly rushed over.

"You take some people and clean up the thieves in the west mountain pass. It's not early, finish early, go to bed early. ”

Pang Shuo was overjoyed, bowed down, and hurried away. He divided the labor with Tu Niu'er, left a dozen or so people to protect Liang Xiao for Tu Niu'er, and rushed to the west side of the hill with the remaining eighty people. Among these more than 80 people, there are more than 20 crossbowmen trained by Liang Xiao himself, and they use pulley crossbows developed by Deng Guobin. Because it was not very convenient to carry, they only brought four pulley crossbows.

There is a steep valley more than 500 steps west of the hot springs, less than five steps wide, but thirty or forty steps high. The mountain walls on both sides resemble a narrow gate. Nearly a thousand mountain thieves are hiding here, waiting for the defeated King of Khotan and the Han envoy to pass by, catch turtles in the urn, and take them right.

They heard shouts of slaughter from the east, and vaguely guessed the situation on the battlefield, but they couldn't figure it out. How many enemies were able to defeat a thousand of their companions in such a short period of time? Even so, they are relieved that they can not only protect themselves from the favorable terrain and have superior forces, but also have the opportunity to attack from behind and turn the tide of the battle in one fell swoop.

Seeing Pang Shuo and the others approaching, these bandits didn't understand what was going on. These Han people have good equipment, helmets, armor, and the weapons in their hands are much better than those of the Qiang people. However, their numbers were too small, no more than a hundred, and it seemed unlikely that they would attack with these people.

Are they here to negotiate, or to persuade them to surrender?

Just when the thieves were speculating about the intentions of Pang Shuo and the others, Pang Shuo had already walked to the cliff, he didn't bring a shield, but just assembled the long knife. He was followed by ten heavily armored foot soldiers, each with a hook in his left hand and a long knife in his right hand. The four crossbowmen, under the cover of the armor, quietly raised the pulley crossbows in their hands.

The pulley crossbow has two major advantages, one is the use of pulley block labor-saving, which allows one person to pull away the ten-stone crossbow. First, it is equipped with clairvoyance, which can aim at a distance of 500 steps. Within two hundred paces, they can almost control the error of the center of the shot to less than three steps. If they use a single arrow, they can easily snipe the opposing generals.

A group of two crossbows, with a cluster of iron arrows, launched a covering blow against the bandits guarding the cliff.

In the darkness, the iron arrows turned into a swarm of flying locusts and shot at the poorly protected bandits.

Screams rang out, and the bandits were shot one after another, falling to the ground and wailing. Most of them were wearing leather armor, some of them didn't even have leather armor, and there were even fewer who wore iron armor, and they had almost no protection in the face of the cluster iron arrows shot by the pulley crossbow two hundred steps away, and the iron arrows penetrated deep into their bodies without exception, and even directly pierced and shot at others.

Four pulley crossbows fired continuously, guided by the torches rocking by the bandits, aiming at the screams of the bandits, and everywhere they went, the screams rang out. The bandits were shot dazed. In the darkness of the night, they could not see clearly, but they heard a strange roar, and a group of people fell, more than a dozen, less than dozens, as unstoppable as a plague.

Fear hurts more than iron arrows, and the bandits are frightened and don't know what kind of witchcraft the Han people use. They remembered the story they had just heard not long ago, that hundreds of Han Chinese had easily defeated more than 20,000 allied troops, and had also killed the Celestial Wolf, who was superior in archery, and that was the kind of witchcraft they used?

Almost instantly, the bandits were in disarray, and they didn't care about defending at all, just looking for a safe place to hide and pray. For such an extremely powerful but invisible enemy, they can only pray and flee.

Pang Shuo easily broke through the first line of defense of the bandits, waved his iron knife, cut off one of the Qiang people who came up, and slashed the other one with a knife back. Blood shot out, spilling the faces of the other Qiang people, and also carrying them from one horror to another.

Compared with those invisible crossbow arrows that kill people, Pang Shuo and the iron knife in his hand are a real threat, he strides forward, the iron knife flies, there is no one in front of him, those who avoid it die, and those who deserve it die.

Ten heavily armored foot soldiers quickly followed.

They were not in a hurry to kill their opponents, and maintained an unhurried rhythm, killing the Qiang people who rushed to the front one by one, and none of them missed the net. Their slaughter frightened the Qiang, who quickly turned from counterattack to retreat, and were killed step by step.

The crossbowmen quickly took up the high ground, condescending, firing continuously.

Although the Qiang people are numerous, they are limited by the narrow terrain and cannot give full play to the advantage of troops, the Qiang people in the distance watch their companions being killed, and the whip is beyond their reach, while the crossbow arrows of the Han army can often fly from hundreds of steps away, and the accurate shooting makes the Qiang people unable to guard against it. They didn't even know which direction the bolts were fired from, and they were shot like evil spirits.

But all those Qiang who shouted more fiercely, or behaved bravely, were killed one after another, and several iron arrows were struck in their bodies, blood gurgled and they soon died.

With the enemy killed three or four hundred paces away, there was no way to talk about defense, and the exclamations of the Qiang people came and went, and panic spread rapidly, further weakening their resistance. Pang Shuo and the others sped up the speed of their attacks, squeezing the living space of the Qiang bandits step by step.

The night was dark, and although there were torches to illuminate, most of the Qiang people could not see the situation of the battlefield clearly, nor did they know how many enemies there were. All they knew was that people were being killed on their side, and the screams were one after another, one after another, which made people panic.

Eventually, they could not bear this psychological blow, collapsed, gave up resistance, and fled in all directions.

While Pang Shuo was chasing and killing, he ordered the drum to be beaten and reported the battle situation to Liang Xiao.

――

Liang Xiao was the first to hear the victorious war drums, but he didn't say anything. He watched the king of Khotan fidget, he watched the king of Khotan care about the battle situation on the east side for a while, worry about the battle situation on the west side for a while, and then be alone in a daze, occasionally sneaking a glance at him.

Liang Xiao immersed his body in the hot spring, enjoying the rare silence. It was a strange feeling, and although there was a fierce battle going on around him, he was soaking in the spring water, enjoying the calm and calmness.

Stealing half a day's leisure.

Unfortunately, such enjoyment was short-lived after all, and after solving the problem of provisions, he had to leave Khotan to find a place to spend the winter. Taking advantage of this winter, he has to think carefully about how to deal with Wusun Kunmo's arrogance.

Hunting Jiaomi decided to learn from the turtle and hide in Akita Castle and not come out, although it seems a little cowardly, which does not match his reputation as a natural hero, but I have to say that this is definitely a smart choice.

Liang Xiao had never been to Chigu City, but he had heard Li Danghu talk about the situation in Chigu City, and he had also heard Dongfang Shuo describe the dangers of Chigu City many times. If he wants to storm Akatani Castle, not to mention that he only has 20,000 soldiers, even if he has 100,000 or 200,000, he can't do it. Once the exploitation of the countries is excessive, it will inevitably cause a backlash from the countries, and when the time comes, he will be in a dilemma, and he can only look at the arrogant eyes of hunting.

Liang Xiao moved to Dongfang Shuo's side and whispered in Chinese: "Man Qian, how can you get rid of the hunting arrogance?" ”

Dongfang Shuo smiled: "Don't worry, there is still half a year, we can think slowly." Akiti Castle is just a city. Whether you can defend the city or not depends not only on the city, but also on the people. You take a break first, draw the bow and leap like you, watch me open and close vertically and horizontally, and be Su Qin once. ”

Liang Xiao agreed-

(To be continued.) )